DEATH BY HOMEWORK

Ok. I didn't really die, but it came close. At one desperate point, my entire body was being upheld by my forehead resting on a whiteboard. And yes, that is a true story. Embarrassing, dramatic, ridiculous, and very true.

In authentic pre-service teacher fashion, I reflected upon how I could get to such a low point and I came up with a description of myself that helped me come to an understanding of why I might be experiencing a tinge of insanity:

I am a mother of four children--one of which has autism and epilepsy; and another one of which has ADHD to beat the band and plays tuba in the band (need I say more?); and another one of which is akin to yelling every. single. time. things don't go her way (can we say mini-me?); and the last of the another ones of which won't/can't stop having accidents that cause decidedly wet, smelly laundry; and all of which have this thing for playing games together that somehow cause this magical thing to happen where confetti-sized paper, trash, and toys fall off their bodies leaving behind great heaping piles that take two hours for an adult to clean up--who goes to school part-time, who is getting divorced, who used to be an overachiever until life broke her down, who cares too much sometimes about what people think, who doesn't fit in anywhere anymore at anytime no matter what and feels all of this quite keenly. So yeah. And did I mention I have to go in public to grocery shop and stuff?

I also reflected on how I coped with getting through the past few weeks of the semester that may or may not have been very healthy. Instead of working really hard to eat good, healthy brain food, I embraced my inner food addict and bought the trashiest junk food known to woman for my work sessions. I twisted healthy stuff into a binge fest. I have had toxic amounts of Peeps, Whoppers, grape Red Vines, Raisin Bran with a ton of sugar on top, doughnuts, Swedish meatballs, pierogies, Zingers, and those lovely purple Snoballs (as pictured above).  I wish I would have done better, but I am not in a good place right now and I figured I needed to work with the skills I've got to get things done. And I finally got all the papers and projects done. Hallelujah! I really thought it wouldn't be possible, but after much prayer, pondering, and working as hard as humanly possible, it all worked out-- despite my horrendous brain food famine. 

And so the moral of the story is:

Work as hard as you can. Give it all you've got. Then, turn the rest over to the Lord and He will make up the difference.

I know--I am His poster child.